After finally taking the plunge and deciding to take a year off to travel around the world, we are documenting our trip as we go. From the initial planning stages to the trip home, this is our journey.

Wednesday, 2 May 2012

Easter Island

At the risk of
humiliating myself, I must make a confession:

Before I went there, I didn’t really
think of Easter Island as an island.

Of course, I knew
that it was a mass of land surrounded on all sides by water, but I
never realized that it had a distinct island culture,
complete with palm trees, sandy beaches and women with flowers behind
their ears.

I don’t know, I
guess I expected it to be cold and harsh, wind-swept and wild, like
Ireland, which, coincidentally, is also an island that I don’t
think of as one. Despite the word “Island” in its name, and the
fact that Easter Island is almost as close in distance to Tahiti as
it is to Chile, I simply didn’t consider the immense body of water
surrounding the land.

So I was pleasantly
surprised to be welcomed at the airport with a necklace made of
flowers, to hear the soft beat of island music and to see fishing
boats loaded with fresh seafood pulling into the small harbors around
the island’s only village.

That’s how daft I
can be- I was surprised
to find fresh seafood on a freaking island!

However, despite the
significant South Pacific influence on the culture and the fact that
most islanders consider themselves to be more Polynesian than
Chilean, the tiny island is not just a tropical paradise. The 63
square mile (164 km) land mass can be rugged, the rocky coastline
forbidding. Most of the island is uninhabited, with the vast majority
of the 5,000-strong population concentrated in the village. It’s
easy to find yourself completely alone on one of the dirt roads that
connect all of the archeological sites and it’s even common to be
the only person at the sites themselves.

Which is one of the
reasons that Easter Island, or Rapa Nui, as the locals call it, was
the highlight of our trip so far.

Those the big head
statues, the reason we were all there, are one of the most recognized
sights in the world and there is just no
one there to see them! Sure, there are a few tour
vans that pull into the bigger sites in the middle of the day, but
for the most part, there were never more than four or five other
people at any of the statues, or moai,
we visited. Oftentimes, we were completely alone to contemplate those
massive faces that gazed right back at us like some eternal staring contest.

The moai
merit their fame. They are hugely impressive- massive rock sculptures
with their backs to the sea, some up to 50 feet tall. When you see
them you can’t help but think of the people who made them and how
much work went into building these enormous tributes to some nameless
deity. Nearly all of the moai stand on the coast, scattered all
around the island, and the majority of the statues have their backs
to the sea as if they are surveying the island's interior. The
result is that the views over the moai have the spectacular
background of deep blue waves crashing against the black volcanic
coastline. It’s breathtaking.

No matter how hard I tried, I just couldn't seem to look like a moai

Vincent got it right on his first try

Almost more
impressive than these man-made wonders was the natural beauty of the
island itself. Despite its small size, the island has a varied
landscape, complete with volcanic craters, 150 foot-high cliffs that
plunge into the aquamarine waters below, forests of eucalyptus, palm
and pine trees, rolling green mountains and underground volcanic lava
tunnels.

The volcanic crater

Watching the waves and narrating their movement with exclamations of "BAM!" and "POW!", complete with hand gestures

The island's tininess makes it incredibly accessible. Nearly the entire land mass can be visited in one day with a car, which is what most
of the tourists we saw were doing: renting a car to drive from site to site,
getting out at each to take a picture or two before getting back in
the car and driving away.

But that simply doesn’t do the place justice.

We spent four full
days in Easter Island hiking, biking and, one day, renting a scooter
to see all that the island had to offer. We hiked up to a massive
coastal volcano to see its crater that was filled with fresh water and teeming
with its own unique eco-system. The next day, we walked along the
rocky coast, through fields with wild horses and along black volcanic
rock cliffs, exploring ancient caves and spiritual sites along the
way. We were the only people doing that particular path on foot and
only two of about 10 people who were doing it at all.

The third day, we
rented mountain bikes and rode through the island’s interior,
passing small residences and protected forests until we arrived at
Rapa Nui’s only beach, a beautiful, secluded stretch of fine sand,
lined with palm trees and over-looked by seven moai, lined up right there
on the beach.

The last day, we
woke up before dawn and took our rented scooter to the east coast of
the island to watch the sun rise over one of the most spectacular
archeological sites in the world: a line of 15 moai on a platform,
with their backs to the rocky coastline and the Pacific Ocean beyond.
There were only about six other people sharing the view with us and
we soon found ourselves completely alone, sitting on a rock, and
gazing out into the soft pink-gray light on those solemn, elongated
faces that we had seen in countless magazine photos. It was a
deeply humbling experience, and was made all the more moving by the
fact that there were no other tourists there to share it with.

That’s what made
the place so amazing. Easter Island is like a big, open-air museum,
except it’s completely open to the public and free of ticket lines,
entry fees (except for two of the biggest sites) and crowds. It’s
like Rome, with one ancient site after another, but without the
throngs of tourists in their fanny packs, camera straps and socks
with sandals. Visiting the island gave us a genuine sense of
exploration. Despite our maps, we felt like we were discovering the
place, getting to know the landscape and actually taking the time to
appreciate the different facets of the island.

We saved the
biggest, most impressive site for last: the quarry where the people
of Rapa Nui constructed the moai before moving them to the various
religious sites throughout the island. The quarry underlined the
history of those people and the disastrous end to their civilization.
The site is filled with huge moai- many upright, but partially buried
from erosion, some only half-finished, and still others knocked down
and broken- illustrating how those who made them still believed in
the statues’ spiritual power when their culture was decimated. The statues jut out of the ground at strange angles, like neglected gravestones of the people who created them. The
fact that the history of that civilization and its demise is still a
mystery makes the site even more haunting.

While most tourists
and historians are preoccupied by the ancient civilization of Easter
Island, we were instantly smitten with the current one. The Rapa Nui people,
with their open, friendly culture, their beautiful Polynesian looks and their mix of Spanish and Rapa Nui languages, are
fascinating and absolutely wonderful. They were welcoming and curious and didn’t
seem to have any overt resentment towards the masses of tourists that
invade their little island every year. We experienced only genuine
kindness from those with whom we came in contact, including one man
who offered us a ride home from one of our hikes when I stopped him
to ask for directions, and another, a local cowboy named Raphael, who rode next to us
and talked with us for half an hour as we walked back down one of the mountains we had
gone up for a view of the island. Raphael was from Easter
Island but had lived in France for 15 years. He accompanied us as his friends rode ahead, asking us questions in French and Spanish
about our travels and telling stories about his.

The combination of Easter Island's
archeological wonders, natural beauty and lovely people has pushed it to the top of our list of trip highlights. It
was as relaxing as Horcon, as historically spectacular as Machu
Picchu, as unique as the jungle.

Of course, it's not fair to say that it's better than any one of those places- believe me, I tried, and Vincent yelled at me for it, saying it was arrogant and disrespectful to compare places that we should be grateful to experience.

So, with my tail between my legs, my chin down on my chest and in my most humbled, grateful tone of voice, I'll just say that Easter Island was awesome.